How to Find Your Sound on Guitar

August 23rd, 2016

By Tyler Larson

As guitar players, we have an innate tendency to compare ourselves to each other. Whether it’s tone, technique, career status, or something else, we’re always trying to measure our musical situations against those around us. While this isn’t always a bad thing, it can prevent you from finding and embracing your sound on the instrument, so I’d like to suggest a way you can conquer this obstacle.

I came to a realization one day while watching a video of Nick Johnston playing an absolutely ridiculous lick in one of his videos on Facebook. The video was of Nick in the studio laying down a solo for a song on his upcoming album, Remarkably Human, and I couldn’t get over how effortlessly he was playing. I wished I could have written that music.

This is a feeling I think a lot of us understand, because we all have guitarists we look up to and try to emulate at times. As I was having these thoughts, I began to feel a little discouraged.

Suddenly, I found clarity in one simple fact: the music in Nick’s head and the music in my head is completely different. What’s more, Nick can’t hear the music in my head, which gives me just as much musical validity as he has, despite his more advanced technical prowess.

If I was somehow imbued with the majestic skills I had been pining over in Nick’s video, it would completely change the music inside me, effectively destroying the musician I am. I would no longer have original music that felt good (to me) to create; I’d simply become a conduit for someone else’s ideas, which is a direct contradiction of what it means to be an artist.

The difference between gleaning inspiration and yearning for the skills of another is an important distinction to make, and the last thing you want to do is try to be someone you’re not when it comes to creating. If Kurt Cobain was absolutely obsessed with Van Halen and had tried to become a shredder, the awesome music he made would have never seen the light of day. If Yngwie Malmsteen had become infatuated with the pop music of Bon Jovi in the 80s, we never would have gotten “Black Star,” “Arpeggios From Hell” and a brand new style of guitar playing.

The point is, don’t concern yourself with talent or skills you don’t have, because there’s a reason you don’t have them, and that mindset clouds your ability to see the skills you do have. Nobody can create the music in your head except you, so it’s your responsibility to unleash it. Only then will you be truly satisfied!

Tyler Larson is the founder of the guitar-centric website Music is Win. His entertaining guitar-related content receives hundreds of thousands of video views on Facebook per month, and his online guitar courses tout more than 1,500 students with a cumulative 4.7 rating on Udemy. Get in touch with Tyler on Facebook, watch more of his guitar lessons and vlogs on YouTube, and follow him on Twitter and Instagram.

DAVID PEREZ

Hey man, Thanks for that very clear ,honest, truthful and thoughtful explanation of playing your own style and being yourself, being original in how we play and not like other guitarists, It was a humble testimony of your musical expression on guitar etc., I believe that you are a sensitive and considerate person towards others and not boastful in pride,like being self centered like many musicians I have met.keep that additude up, and your music playing real.Thanks Bud!!!
DAVID PEREZ